Recycling pulled bullets

[johngibbs222]

That's why I use an inertia puller, powder and pulled bullets get re-used.
Powder goes in an airtight container with a silicon desiccate pouch and the cast bullets get pushed through the resizer and they all work together.
Jacketed bullets are marked for range use as the factory crimp does mark them up when reloading.
I just pulled about 40 as somehow I managed to push back the shoulders of the cases too much and started getting misfires.

 

[Alibiiv]

A friend gave me a bunch of pulled V max bullets that I would never shoot. He used a collet puller and didn't know how to use it properly, and complete;y ruined them, looks like he used 50 ft lbs of torque and made a doughnut on them. There is a lot of lead and cooper, so any ideas how to recycle them? Hate to just pitch them out!

Wasaaaaayyyyyy back in the day (many decades) I used to pick up fired bullets out of the tire backstop behind the target stands at the range, jacketed or cast. I was casting bullets because I was shooting a lot of .38 special pistol matches and that is what we did back then. Once the melting pot got hot the jacketed bullets went into the melting pot with the rest of the recovered lead along with some wheel weights. The lead would melt out of the jackets and the jackets would float on top of the lead, and then they would get skimmed out of the lead pot. That is the best use that I can think of to recycle pulled bullets.

I use both an inertia puller and a collet puller. If the bullets are crimped hard the collet puller in all likelihood will damage the diameter of the bullets I am pulling. With the inertia puller if I put two or three foam ear plugs in the bottom of the inertia puller before hammering the bullet out, I have found that most of the time that bullet is reusable again. A while back I could not find any brass for my .35 Remington. In my travels I found 4 boxes of "really" old .35 Remington loaded ammunition. The heads were corroded so I pulled them. I did save those 200gr round nose bullets and did some sighting in of a scope and did some plinking with them.

 

[dstancu]

View attachment 728869

If they all look the same, I think they are pretty much OK to be reused for standard applications. I saw a testing video done by MDT (they put to the test all sort of funny ideas, love that, kinda Mith Busters style ). They were looking at damaged bullets as results of abuse, from slight to aggressive, like shaking vigorously in a box, droping on the concrete floor from a height, scratching, broken tips, cut tips, corroded etc. Then shot for accuracy and precision at 100y and 500y, side by side with pristine bullets. In almost all cases there were no discernable differences, The only bullets that did not meet the 500y precision/accuracy test were the ones with the tips cut off!!
https://mdttac.com/us/video/when-is-a-bullet-too-damaged-to-shoot
Apart from that, I figured out on my own that bullets with "ring/donut" marks are OK (don't ask me how I know that).

 

[RODSTRADLEY]

If they all look the same, I think they are pretty much OK to be reused for standard applications. I saw a testing video done by MDT (they put to the test all sort of funny ideas, love that, kinda Mith Busters style ). They were looking at damaged bullets as results of abuse, from slight to aggressive, like shaking vigorously in a box, droping on the concrete floor from a height, scratching, broken tips, cut tips, corroded etc. Then shot for accuracy and precision at 100y and 500y, side by side with pristine bullets. In almost all cases there were no discernable differences, The only bullets that did not meet the 500y precision/accuracy test were the ones with the tips cut off!!
https://mdttac.com/us/video/when-is-a-bullet-too-damaged-to-shoot
Apart from that, I figured out on my own that bullets with "ring/donut" marks are OK (don't ask me how I know that).

I am going to fire some when it gets warmer, and see what happens

 

[johngibbs222]

dstancu many thanks for that link, another way to waste my life!!!!!!

 

[Ol' Red]

How did you get the molten lead out of the copper jackets?

You put the whole bullet in the pot and heat it. The lead will separate when melted and the copper floats to the top due to being lighter weight.
I admit that your way of holding the bullet with your fingers sounds more exciting. I wonder if I can get my sister in law to hold the first bullet.

 

[shootist7]

I'll reiterate, load some and shoot them. You might be surprised....

 

[RODSTRADLEY]

I'll reiterate, load some and shoot them. You might be surprised....

I am going to when it warms up enough, and the snow melts! lol

 

[imyourhuckleberry]

Many years ago, I use to recover backstop range bullets, wash them, let dry and then about 20# at a time, melt the lead out of the jackets in a cast iron pot over a fire. When well melted, I used a large metal kitchen spoon that had holes in it for dipping things out of hot grease and skimmed the copper jackets and debri off the top of the denser lead. Then after fluxing again, I poured the lead into ingots to later use in my electric casting furnaces for bullet casting.

We have recovered untold amounts of range lead this way.

These is how I have done it for years. Also you could use the bullets to help you fire form brass.

 

[dennisinaz]

Run them through a die and shoot them

 

[RODSTRADLEY]

Run them through a die and shoot them

I'll run them through a cheap barrel on an AR.